Terms of Service

Effective date: 12 November 2026

These Terms of Service ("Terms") are an agreement between Digital Accounting Solutions LLC, doing business as SmartAccountant.ai ("SmartAccountant", "we", "us") and the business that buys or uses our service ("you", "your firm"). By completing checkout, ticking the box to accept these Terms, creating an account, or using the service, you agree to these Terms on behalf of your firm, and you confirm you have the authority to do so. If you do not agree, do not buy or use the service.

1. What the service is

1.1 The service. SmartAccountant provides web-based software for accounting and bookkeeping firms (the "Service"). It reviews the financial exports your firm loads into it (for example a general ledger, payroll reports or vendor lists) against written rules ("Rulebooks"), and produces workpapers, exception lists and related reports. The tools available to you depend on the plan you bought (for example Year-End Essential), as described at checkout.

1.2 How your files are handled. The Service is designed so that the client files your firm loads are read and checked inside your own web browser, on your own computer. Those files are not uploaded to our servers. The only exception is the optional AI review, if your firm switches it on (section 3.5). What we do store is described in section 7 and in our Privacy Policy.

1.3 A tool, not professional advice. The Service is a review aid. It does not provide accounting, tax, audit, legal or other professional advice, and it does not prepare, sign or file any return. Every result must be reviewed by a qualified person at your firm before it is relied on or given to a client. The Service flags items for review; it does not guarantee that every error, omission or irregularity in a file will be found, and an item it flags is not necessarily an error. Your firm remains solely responsible for its professional work, its judgments, and its advice to its clients.

1.4 Rules and tax years. Rulebooks reflect our understanding of the rules for the tax years shown in the Service on the date they are published. Laws, regulations and agency guidance change. We do not guarantee that a Rulebook is complete or current for every situation, and you are responsible for confirming any figure, threshold or deadline that matters to your work.

1.5 Changes to the Service. We improve the Service over time. We may add, change or remove features, provided we do not materially reduce the core function of the plan you paid for during your paid period.

1.6 Buying before launch day. If you buy before the Service opens (launch day, shown at checkout and in the Service), your login works straight away so you can look around and run the example company, and everything else opens on launch day. Your 12 months of access start on launch day, not on the day you buy.

2. Accounts and security

2.1 Your accounts. Before checkout we ask for an email address, and the person who buys gets a login for it. We create further logins for your firm's staff when you ask. You are responsible for everything done through your firm's logins, for keeping passwords private, and for telling us promptly when someone leaves your firm so we can remove their access.

2.2 Two-step sign-in. We offer two-step sign-in (a code from an authenticator app). We strongly recommend it for every login, and we may require it.

2.3 Your firm key. Some information (such as client names and briefs, open items, and optional dollar detail in the run log) can be scrambled in your browser with a key that only your firm holds, so that we cannot read it. We do not keep a copy of that key. If your firm loses its recovery code, information scrambled with it cannot be recovered by anyone, including us.

2.4 Tell us about a problem. If you believe a login has been misused, tell us right away at support@smartaccountant.ai.

3. Your responsibilities for client data

3.1 You control your clients' data. Your firm decides what information to load into the Service and is responsible for having the right, and any consent your clients or the law require, to process it.

3.2 Data you must not load. Do not load Social Security numbers, full taxpayer identification numbers, bank or card account numbers, dates of birth or other sensitive personal information unless the tool you are using specifically asks for it. The Service scans for some of this information and masks or stops on it, but you remain responsible for what you load.

3.3 Your legal obligations. If your firm is subject to the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act Safeguards Rule, Internal Revenue Code section 7216, state privacy or data-breach laws, or professional confidentiality rules, you remain responsible for meeting them. We act as a service provider to your firm.

3.4 Optional AI drafting. The Service can draft a client context card from notes your firm pastes in (for example a brain dump or call notes), using an AI model provided by Anthropic (see the Privacy Policy). It is off until your firm switches it on, which requires a person with authority to accept, for your firm, the drafting conditions shown in the Service. We record who accepted, when, and which version of the conditions. If we change the conditions, drafting stops for your firm until it accepts the new version. Before notes are sent, the Service replaces the client's name with its code, replaces the owners and related parties listed in that client's brief, and removes the identification and account numbers, phone numbers, email addresses, street addresses and dates of birth it can detect; our server checks again and refuses notes that still contain them. Other names are not detected, so use initials. For each draft, the person sending it confirms that the notes contain no tax return information for that client, or that the client has given a consent that covers sending them. You are responsible for that confirmation being true, for getting any consent the law requires (including under Section 7216 of the Internal Revenue Code), and for reviewing every drafted line before using it. Drafting is limited to 10 drafts per person and 30 per firm in any hour.

3.5 Optional AI review. The Service can add an AI review to its year-end reviews, using an AI provider your firm chooses (currently Anthropic, OpenAI, Google, xAI or Mistral) and your firm's own account and key. It is off until your firm switches it on, which requires a person with authority to accept, for your firm, the AI review conditions shown in the Service; we record who accepted, when, and which version, and if the conditions change the AI review stops until your firm accepts the new version. When it is on, after each year-end review your browser sends the review's data, with your firm's key, to our server, which adds the review's instructions and passes it to that provider. For GL Error Detection the review's data is the workpaper's findings and figures and only the ledger rows those findings rest on (the other rows are not sent); for the Payroll to GL Tie-Out (W-3) and the 1099 review it is the rows of the files uploaded for the review. Before sending, it replaces the client's name with its code, replaces the owners and related parties listed in that client's brief, and removes the identification and account numbers, phone numbers, email addresses, street addresses and dates of birth it can detect; vendor and payee names, dates, accounts, descriptions and amounts are sent. The data, the answer and your firm's key pass through our server only for the length of that review and are not stored; your firm's key is stored with your account only in scrambled form we cannot read. You are responsible for your firm's agreement with that provider and its settings (use an account whose terms say it does not train on your data), for getting any consent the law requires before client data is sent (including under Section 7216 of the Internal Revenue Code), for the provider's charges, and for reviewing every item of the AI review before acting on it. For GL Error Detection the AI review writes only the words of the workpaper for the findings the Service's checks made; for the other reviews its findings are suggestions. Neither is part of the Service's tested checks, and we are not responsible for the availability, accuracy or conduct of your firm's AI provider.

4. Acceptable use

You will not, and will not allow anyone to: (a) copy, resell, sublicense, rent or share the Service, the Rulebooks or their outputs with anyone outside your firm, except that you may give your own clients the workpapers and reports made from their files; (b) reverse engineer, decompile, disassemble or extract the Rulebooks or the Service's code, including by inspecting, saving or copying the code, rules, checks, thresholds or instructions the Service sends to your browser so that the reviews can run there; (c) use the Rulebooks, their logic or the Service's outputs to build, train or improve another product or service, including an AI model, or to build a competing product; (d) share a login with anyone outside your firm, or access the Service by automated means other than its normal features, or try to get around a security or access control; (e) load anything unlawful, or anything you do not have the right to load; or (f) use the Service in a way that breaks the law or harms others.

5. Ownership

5.1 Ours. The Service, the Rulebooks (including the code, checks, thresholds and instructions that make them up), the workpaper formats, our training content, and all related software and materials are owned by SmartAccountant and its licensors and are protected by intellectual property laws. Nothing in these Terms transfers ownership to you.

5.2 Your license. While your firm's access is current (section 6) and its account is in good standing, we grant your firm a limited, non-exclusive, non-transferable license to use the Service for your firm's internal business and to provide services to your own clients.

5.3 Yours. Your client files, and the workpapers and reports the Service produces from them for your firm, belong to your firm. You may keep and use them after your access ends.

5.4 Feedback. If you send us suggestions, we may use them without obligation to you.

6. Fees, access and renewal

6.1 What you pay. You pay one payment at checkout for 12 months of access to the plan you bought: its tools and the Rulebook updates we publish for it during those 12 months. There is no monthly charge and no per-client fee. The price is the one shown at checkout.

6.2 No automatic renewal. Your access does not renew automatically and we do not charge you again on our own. Before your 12 months end we remind you, and you can renew for another 12 months from inside the Service. A renewal is priced at what your firm first paid for that plan, for as long as you keep renewing.

6.3 Payments. Payments are processed by Stripe. We do not receive or store your full card number. If you pay by card, Stripe keeps the card on file for your firm so that a later purchase you choose to make (for example an upgrade) can be paid in one step; we charge it only when someone at your firm makes such a purchase. Prices exclude taxes unless stated; you are responsible for applicable taxes.

6.4 Price changes. We may change the price of a plan for new purchases at any time. A price change never applies to a payment you have already made, and renewals keep the price your firm first paid (section 6.2).

7. What we store and how we protect it

7.1 What we store. Account details (names and email addresses of your logins), your plan, what your firm paid and when its access ends, your firm's list of client codes, whether your firm has switched on the AI review and which conditions it accepted, a record of each AI review (who ran it, when, its size and the provider's token count, never its content), your firm's AI provider key only in scrambled form we cannot read, the support requests your firm sends us from the Service and our answers, and, only if your firm switches it on, a run log of counts (which review ran, when, and how many items it flagged; never your files, client names, or dollar amounts we can read). The email address given before checkout is kept with the checkout; if the checkout is not completed we may send a few reminder emails about it, each with a way to unsubscribe. Some items can be stored only in scrambled form that we cannot read (section 2.3). Full details are in our Privacy Policy, which forms part of these Terms.

7.2 Security. We use encryption in transit and at rest, access controls on every request, optional two-step sign-in, and an activity log of account actions. No system is perfectly secure, and we do not promise that the Service will be free of every security incident.

7.3 Records of use. We keep a record of account activity, such as sign-ins, setup steps and each time a Rulebook is delivered to your firm (never your files or their contents). We may use these records to provide support, to keep the Service secure, to enforce section 4, and to respond to a payment dispute.

7.4 If something goes wrong. If we learn of unauthorized access to your firm's data held by us, we will notify you without undue delay and in any event within the time the law requires, and we will give you the information we have.

8. Refunds

8.1 Refunds within 30 days. You may ask for a refund within 30 days of a payment for a purchase or a renewal, for any reason. If someone at your firm has signed in or a Rulebook has been delivered to your firm, we refund 50% of that payment. If no one at your firm has signed in yet and no Rulebook has been delivered, we refund the payment in full. To ask, write to support@smartaccountant.ai or use Help and feedback in the Service.

8.2 After 30 days. After 30 days a payment is not refundable. We may still look at a request case by case, and any refund we then give is at our discretion. We do not give refunds or credits for unused time.

8.3 Billing errors. If we charge you in error (for example a duplicate charge), we will refund the amount charged in error. Tell us within 60 days of the charge.

8.4 Where the law requires a refund. Nothing in these Terms limits a refund the law requires.

8.5 A refund ends access. When we refund a payment for a purchase or a renewal, in part or in full, your firm's access to the Service ends immediately. When we refund an upgrade, your firm goes back to the plan it had before the upgrade. A refund of a charge made in error (section 8.3) does not end access; if access ends automatically when we issue it, we restore it. After access ends, your data is handled as described in section 10.

8.6 Payment disputes. Please contact us at support@smartaccountant.ai before disputing a charge with your bank; most problems are resolved quickly. If you dispute a charge that was valid under these Terms, we may suspend your account until the dispute is resolved, and we may provide your bank and our payment provider with the record of your acceptance of these Terms at checkout and the records described in section 7.3.

9. Term, suspension and ending the agreement

9.1 Term. These Terms apply from the moment you accept them until your firm's account is closed.

9.2 Suspension. We may suspend access, with notice where practical, if: we reasonably believe the account is being misused or is a security risk; or you breach section 3 or 4. We will restore access when the reason is resolved.

9.3 When your 12 months end. If your firm does not renew, its access to the tools pauses at the end of the 12 months: your people can still sign in, see the account and renew, but cannot run reviews or receive Rulebooks. The account's client list, briefs and open items stay with it while the account exists, so a firm that renews picks up where it left off. You may ask us to close the account at any time (section 10).

9.4 Closing for breach. We may close your account if you materially breach these Terms and do not fix the breach within 10 days of notice, or immediately for a breach of section 4 or after a payment dispute under section 8.6 is decided against you.

10. Your data when the account ends

10.1 Export. For 30 days after your account closes, you may ask us for a copy of the data we hold for your firm (the client-code list, run log counts and account records). Information stored in scrambled form is provided as stored and can be opened only with your firm's key.

10.2 Deletion. After that period we delete your firm's data from the Service, except records we must keep by law (for example billing records) and backups, which are deleted on their normal schedule.

11. Disclaimers

The Service is provided "as is" and "as available". To the fullest extent the law allows, we disclaim all warranties, express or implied, including warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, accuracy and non-infringement. We do not warrant that the Service will be uninterrupted, error-free, or that it will detect every error in a file. Some jurisdictions do not allow certain disclaimers, so some of these may not apply to you.

12. Limitation of liability

12.1 To the fullest extent the law allows, neither party is liable for indirect, incidental, special, consequential or punitive damages, or for lost profits, revenue, data, goodwill or business opportunity, even if told such damages were possible.

12.2 To the fullest extent the law allows, SmartAccountant's total liability for all claims relating to the Service or these Terms is limited to the amount your firm paid us in the twelve (12) months before the event giving rise to the claim.

12.3 These limits do not apply to your payment obligations, to your breach of section 4, or to a party's liability that cannot be limited by law.

13. Indemnity

Your firm will defend and indemnify SmartAccountant against third-party claims arising from: (a) the data your firm loads or sends through the Service, including any claim that you lacked the right or consent to process it; (b) your firm's professional services or advice to its clients, including reliance on any output without review; or (c) your breach of these Terms or the law.

14. Confidentiality

Each party will keep the other's non-public business information confidential and use it only to perform these Terms, except where disclosure is required by law. Our Rulebooks and the internal workings of the Service, including the code and rules the Service sends to your browser, are our confidential information.

15. General

15.1 Changes to these Terms. We may update these Terms. For a material change we will give at least 30 days' notice by email or in the Service; continuing to use the Service after the change takes effect means you accept it. A change does not alter a payment already made.

15.2 Governing law and disputes. These Terms are governed by the laws of the State of Arizona, without regard to its conflict-of-law rules. Any dispute arising from these Terms or the Service will be resolved by binding arbitration in Maricopa County, Arizona, administered by the American Arbitration Association under its Commercial Arbitration Rules, on an individual basis and not as part of a class or representative action. Either party may bring a qualifying claim in small claims court, or ask a court for an injunction to protect its intellectual property or confidential information.

15.3 Notices. We send notices to the email address on your firm's account. You send notices to support@smartaccountant.ai or to Digital Accounting Solutions LLC, 8749 E Cheery Lynn Rd, Scottsdale, AZ 85251.

15.4 Entire agreement. These Terms, the Privacy Policy and anything you accepted at checkout are the entire agreement about the Service and replace earlier discussions about it.

15.5 Other terms. If a part of these Terms cannot be enforced, the rest still applies. Our not enforcing a right is not a waiver of it. You may not transfer these Terms without our written consent; we may transfer them with our business. Neither party is liable for delay caused by events beyond its reasonable control.

15.6 Contact. Digital Accounting Solutions LLC, doing business as SmartAccountant.ai, 8749 E Cheery Lynn Rd, Scottsdale, AZ 85251, support@smartaccountant.ai.